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So here’s an example of the “Police Loophole” reverse boycott that I mentioned in an older post. For whatever reason, Serbu Firearms was not originally listed in the table, but I’ve since added them since they obviously are taking part.

On 03/18/2013 01:24 PM, XXXXXXXX wrote:
> Mr. Serbu,
>
> My name is XXXXXXXX. I am assigned to the NYPD Firearms and Tactics Section. I have been directed to research a new semi-automatic .50 caliber platform for my department.
>
> Two weeks ago I spoke to Deanne at your office regarding the possibility of obtaining one of your rifles for test and evaluation.
>
> If you would please get back to me either way regarding this proposal I would appreciate it.
>
> XXXXXXXX
> NYPD-FTS”

Serbu replied:

XXXX,
Yes, I got the message and tried to return the call but got no answer. I appreciate your interest in our BFG-50A; I’m sure it would be an excellent addition to your department’s arsenal. Unfortunately, we have a policy of selling to state law enforcement agencies only what is allowed to be sold to private citizens in that state. Since the passage of the NY SAFE act, the BFG-50A is considered an assault weapon and as such is no longer available to private citizens in the state of New York. Therefore we have to respectfully decline to supply your department with BFG-50A rifles.

First, according to Economic Policy Journal, the taxes for Obamacare are already double what was originally estimated.

The Joint Committee on Taxation recently released a 96 page report on the tax provisions associated with Affordable Care Act. The report describes the 21 tax increases included in Obamacare, totaling $1.058 trillion – a steep increase from initial assessment,accordingto the Tax Prof Blog. The summer 2012 estimate is nearly twice the $569 billion estimate produced at the time of the passage of the law in March 2010.

OK, so no one is shocked, whatever.

In other news, the standards for this great new health care system that is now going to cost at least twice as much as originally expected are not being set very high. The Washington Examiner is reporting that Henry Chao (an Obamacare official at the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services) has said “Let’s just make sure it’s not a third-world experience.” Full quote:

“The time for debating about the size of text on the screen or the color or is it a world-class user experience, that’s what we used to talk about two years ago,” Henry Chao, an official at the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services who is overseeing the technology of the exchanges said at a recent conference. “Let’s just make sure it’s not a third-world experience.”

So that sounds great. Honestly, anyone with any sense would know that any service that the government provides is going to be sub-par compared to the private market, but it is a little surprising to see the members of the project to be setting expectations so low. We’ve all heard the stories of the death panels, government decisions on who gets surgeries, shortage of doctors, etc. and they really don’t seem that far fetched when you look at it with this mindset.

[T]he Department of Homeland Security is apparently taking delivery (apparently through the Marine Corps Systems Command, Quantico VA, via the manufacturer – Navistar Defense LLC) of an undetermined number of the recently retrofitted 2,717 ‘Mine Resistant Protected’ MaxxPro MRAP vehicles for service on the streets of the United States.”

These MRAP’s ARE BEING SEEN ON U.S. STREETS all across America by verified observers with photos, videos, and descriptions.”

Regardless of the exact number of MRAP’s being delivered to DHS (and evidently some to POLICE via DHS, as has been observed), why would they need such over-the-top vehicles on U.S. streets to withstand IEDs, mine blasts, and 50 caliber hits to bullet-proof glass? In a war zone… yes, definitely. Let’s protect our men and women. On the streets of America… ?”

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According to the AP story a DHS spokesperson justifies this acquisition to “help the government get a low price for a big purchase.” Peggy Dixon, spokeswoman for the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center: “The training center and others like it run by the Homeland Security Department use as many as 15 million rounds every year, mostly on shooting ranges and in training exercises.” At 15 million rounds (which, in itself, is pretty extraordinary and sounds more like fun target-shooting-at-taxpayer-expense than a sensible training exercise) … that’s a stockpile that would last DHS over a century.

OK, I’m not a conspiracy theorist and never have been. I have always maintained that the purpose of the second amendment is to protect the peoples’ rights from their government, but I still sometimes cringe when I hear that in a gun control argument on national TV, just because I know it can come off as crazy. But seriously, what the hell? Enough ammo to sustain a war similar to Iraq for 20 years? Armored/mine resistant vehicles? In America?

“DHS routinely establishes strategic sourcing contracts that combine the requirements of all its components for commonly purchased goods and services such as ammunition,” a DHS legislative affairs person wrote to Coburn. “These strategic sourcing contracts help leverage the purchasing power of DHS to efficiently procure equipment and supplies at significantly lower costs,” the department told Coburn.

So, it’s kind of like when you go to the grocery store and the canned corn is on sale so you buy enough to last you 20 years if you ate 20 cans a day. You do stuff like that, right?

According to CNS News there is now a growing number of states who are creating their own laws in an attempt to shield their citizens from the possible upcoming anti-gun laws that Obama and his partners are attempting to pass.

At the bottom is a list of the states and their planned bills. Not included is South Carolina, where the “South Carolina Firearms Freedom Act” was filed by Sen. Lee Bright (R-Spartanburg) one day before the Newtown, Connecticut shooting. This bill would exempt any gun made in SC from any type of federal regulation. In addition, Governor Nikki Haley has recently confirmed her support for both the 2nd Amendment and the 10th Amendment.

In Ohio, two senators have introduced SB36, which would prohibit firearms seizures, registration and bans in their state.

Sen. Jared Carpenter introduced a bill that would prohibit Kentucky from enforcing new federal gun control laws if they’re enacted. The measure passed by a vote of 34-3.

The Idaho House of Representatives passed a bill that criminalizes the act of enforcing any new federal laws than ban, restrict, confiscate, or require registration of firearms or ammunition in violation of the state’s constitution.

HB219 passed by a 55-13 vote.

In Louisiana, Rep. Jim Morris sponsored a bill that “prohibits the enforcement of federal restrictions regarding the ownership or possession of semi-automatic firearms.”

The House Public Safety Committee in Oklahoma passed HB2021 that would also prohibit the enforcement of federal gun laws.

House Bill 1076, sponsored by Rep. Steve Toth in Texas, would disallow state and local police from enforcing new gun control measures passed by the federal government.

In Kansas, the House approved three pro-gun bills, one of which prohibits the federal government from enforcing gun laws or bans on firearms and accessories manufactured, sold, or kept in the state.

The “Arizona Firearms: Prohibited Enforcement” bill would make it a Class 6 felony for the federal government to enforce new laws or regulations on guns, accessories and ammunition owned or manufactured in the state.

Senate bill 63 in Michigan would exempt firearms and firearms accessories made and sold exclusively in Michigan from federal gun restrictions.

And in Washington State, a state that recently legalized the recreational use of marijuana, the House has introduced HB 1371 which reads as follows:

“Any federal law, rule, regulation, or order created or effective on or after January 1, 2013, shall be unenforceable within the borders of Washington if the law, rule, regulation, or order attempts to: (a) Ban or restrict ownership of a semiautomatic firearm or any magazine of a firearm; or (b) Require any firearm, magazine, or other firearm accessory to be registered in any manner.”

The government in Cyprus has decided that to fund their bailouts, they will take 10% of the citizens’ savings accounts. Of course, word of this caused a mad dash to ATM’s as people attempted to save the money they thought they were already saving. So, the government has now shut down the banks for a few days to prevent this.

And who actually thinks this couldn’t or won’t happen here in America? When I first heard of this I thought it was pretty crazy… then after thinking about it for a few minutes I thought “yea I could see that happening here.”

First of all, I know American liberals are salivating at the idea. All they have to do is to frame it in the right context of class warfare and I think they could even get a large number of Americans to support it. Hey, if they’re going to take the money from the “rich” and “give it to the “poor,” what’s wrong with that, right? We’ve already discussed in the past the notion that the poor deserve the money that the rich have accumulated. I’ve also noted that our government already indirectly takes money from the rich and gives it to the poor through the use of tax brackets, so is it really a big difference to take it from a bank account as opposed to taking it from a paycheck?

I do think that the liberals better work harder on their gun control plans first though, because I do think that the victims of any account pilfering would view it differently than their normal taxation.

Honestly, there is rarely anything to add to an Ann Coulter article, so here’s the full link at WorldNetDaily and here are a few choice quotes:

Like the proverbial monkey typing for infinity and getting Shakespeare, Mayor Bloomberg’s obsession with reforming New Yorkers’ health has finally produced a brilliant ad campaign.

………………………………

Far from opposing stigmas, liberals are the main propagators of them – against cigarettes, guns, plastic bags, obesity, not recycling, Fox News, racist “code words,” not liking “Lincoln” and junk food.

………………………………

One begins to suspect that liberals aren’t as interested in stopping teenagers from having illegitimate kids as they claim. Do they believe a teenager who gets pregnant out of wedlock is harming herself and her child as much a teenager who smokes? How about an unwed teen who smokes at a landfill?

It’s only a “shame-and-blame game” when liberals secretly approve of the behavior they pretend to oppose.

………………………………

The only thing single mothers are “victims” of is their own choice to have sex with men they’re not married to. Liberals seem to believe that drinking soda is voluntary, but getting pregnant is more like catching the flu.

It would be hard to make the case that fast food, plastic bags and cigarettes do more damage than single motherhood.

Controlling for socioeconomic status, race and place of residence, the strongest predictor of whether a person will end up in prison is that he was raised by a single mother.

At least 70 percent of juvenile murderers, pregnant teenagers, high school dropouts, teen suicides, runaways and juvenile delinquents were raised by single mothers.

A study back in 1990 by the Progressive Policy Institute showed that, absent single motherhood, there would be no difference in black and white crime rates.

There are a number of articles about this, but the one at WISTV does a fairly good job of explaining the situation. To sum up,

Automatic yearly raises would be out, and a new incentive plan would be in. But many South Carolina teachers have concerns about the bill, and are worried that student performance will weigh heavily on how they’re compensated.

Governor Nikki Haley and State Superintendent Mick Zais are both Republicans, and both campaigned on basing teacher pay at least in part on how their students perform. This bill could allow that to happen, and that has some teachers worried.

Now, I need to do some research on Governor Haley’s stance on this, because I usually agree with her on most things, but if she truly supports a teacher pay scale that is based on student performance then I am in definite disagreement.

This bill does not necessarily lead to the use of student performance as a measuring stick for teacher pay…

The bill does not lay out a new pay scale. Instead, it calls for an “incentive compensation plan” which would be designed by a committee of teachers through the Department of Education. It also gets rid of automatic pay raises, and lets districts decide whether to give teacher’s pay increases each year.

The bill is expected to pass, but we won’t know how teachers will be evaluated or what factors will be included in the incentive compensation plan until that committee gets to work.

…however, it does seem like the ultimate goal. There are a number of reasons that this is a bad idea. To start, if anyone thinks that teachers are the main reason for poor student performance, especially in poor economic areas, they should think again. Maybe they should look at a popular culture that places little to no importance on school? But that would be a much more difficult problem to fix. Some of the family situations these kids are in are just not suitable for success – sure there are exceptions, but for the most part, an excellent teacher is not going to get through to a 12 year old who already has gang/drug ties. That’s just the truth. And the teacher’s pay will suffer because of this student’s presence in their class?

For some reason I see a future with an even smaller number of teachers with the desire to teach in low-income area schools.

We all know that Obama’s/liberals’ plan is to vilify the rich and make them seem like they all got their money without working, that the poor and middle class actually deserve that money, and that if the poor and middle class can’t actually directly take that money from them, they at least need to “pay their fair share” of taxes so that it can be redistributed to the poor and middle class.

I discussed this with someone the other day who said that the Republicans look bad in the media because it looks like they are only looking out for the “rich.” There are a couple of problems with that – first, “rich” must be defined. Currently it is $250,000 a couple (remember, if you and your spouse make less than this then it was promised your taxes wouldn’t go up?). As the economy gets worse and government gets greedier, that number is sure to go down.

Another problem is, even if the rich did not pay “their fair share,” a tax increase on them, no matter how high, is not going to cure the governments debt/spending problem. It won’t even come close.

And, the fact is, the rich already pay more than their fair share. According to CNBC,

“…it turns out wealthy families already are paying some of their biggest federal tax bills in decades even as the rest of the population continues to pay at historically low rates.”

Here are some other facts from the article:

- “For 2013, families with incomes in the top 20 percent of the nation will pay an average of 27.2 percent of their income in federal taxes”

- “The top one percent of households, those with incomes averaging $1.4 million, will pay an average of 35.5 percent. Those tax rates, which include income, payroll, corporate and estate taxes, are among the highest since 1979.”

- “The average family in the bottom 20 percent of households won’t pay any federal taxes. Instead, many families in this group will get payments from the federal government by claiming more in credits than they owe in taxes, including payroll taxes. That will give them a negative tax rate.”

Now I will re-state these facts with emphasis

- THE TOP 1% RICHEST PEOPLE IN THE COUNTRY PAY 35.5% OF THE TAXES IN AMERICA

- THE BOTTOM 20% POOREST PEOPLE IN THE COUNTRY PAY NO MONEY, IN FACT THEY GET PAID!

Remember what I said in the beginning about not being able to forcibly take the money from the rich? In effect, the government is doing it for them. If this isn’t the definition of “redistribution of wealth” then I don’t know what is. There always has been some form of it, because of assistance/entitlement programs, etc. that obviously the taxpayers pay for, but this is literally money being taken from the rich and given directly to the “poor.”

So, now that the “rich” are paying their “fair share,” how many more years will it be until all of our problems are solved?

Oh, almost missed a good quote -

“Spite and envy are not sound bases for public policy.” – J.D. Foster, a fellow at the conservative Heritage Foundation.

“There are some states, counties, cities, and municipalities in our great nation that fail to allow their citizens to fully exercise their right to keep and bear arms with restrictions such as magazine capacity or types of firearms. However, these government entities do not place these restrictions upon their own employees, such as police officers.”

However, there is a growing list of gun manufacturers who refuse to support these government agencies that do not allow their citizens the same freedoms. A couple of weeks ago, I read an article about this that listed these manufacturers, and at the time I thought that there were probably even more companies that did the same thing, but had not come out and openly stated it.

Well, according to CNS News, it looks like I was right, as in a new article they are reporting that the number of these gun manufacturers has tripled to a list that now includes 118 companies.

You can see the current list (which appears to have grown to 126 now) over on the main page of The Police Loophole, and I’ve also included a copy below as of today (03/11/2013).

If you’re a gun owner (or plan to become one) comment below and let me know if you plan on supporting these manufacturers.

Republicans/conservatives/people who don’t agree with abortion have always been accused of being anti-womens’ rights.

The PJ Tatler has a good story that shows why anti-gun liberals are actually the ones who are attempting to restrict the rights of women. And not on something like the right to abort the child in their body, but the very right to survive an attack by a criminal and continue to live their life.

”…Colorado state Sen. Evie Hudak who, at a hearing on banning concealed carry on college campuses, told rape survivor Amanda Collins that having a gun would not have done her any good. Collins had just shared her story of survival. Democrat Hudak berated her in response.

‘I just want to say, statistics are not on your side, even if you had had a gun. You said that you were a martial arts student, I mean person, experience in taekwondo, and yet because this individual was so large and was able to overcome you even with your skills, and chances are that if you had had a gun, then he would have been able to get than from you and possibly use it against you …’”

So here’s another example of a government-knows-and-solves-it-all liberal who is telling a woman that she should just forget about having a gun to protect herself and just trust him that it wouldn’t help anyway. I’m not sure what he personally recommends she use for protection in the case of an attack, but honestly what does it matter? I highly doubt that he actually had a concern for her safety, he appears to just have been pissed off that someone attempted to present a legitimate use for a law-abiding citizen owning a gun.